


one plus six

by JustMcShane



Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who (Big Finish Audio)
Genre: Angst, Friendship, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Hypothermia, Medical Inaccuracies, Platonic Cuddling, Seven Loves His Friends (You Can't Change My Mind), cuddling for warmth, probably
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-07
Updated: 2018-07-07
Packaged: 2019-06-06 18:51:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,271
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15201176
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JustMcShane/pseuds/JustMcShane
Summary: For the first half hour of wandering through the forest outside the biodome, everything was fine – despite the fact that they were, of course, veryverylost.And then it wasn’t.





	one plus six

**Author's Note:**

> Sometimes you just need shameless fluff, inexplicable h/c and team dynamics. I know I do.
> 
> Before Protect & Survive, post-A Death in the Family. Spoilers for that last one. Thank you to dearest Jane for the light editing work. I would not be alive still without you. I know that you haven't got around to a final edit, but hopefully you can make any due changes tomorrow, in the cold hard light of day.

They were running for their lives again.

Typical.

In fairness, the blame for this particular endeavour was in all likeliness shared between the three of them. It was Hex’s fault (although ‘fault’ probably wasn’t the best word to use here, but needs must) for noticing the rather unethical medical procedures that the base was putting to work, causing a fuss, and getting subsequently thrown into alien jail. It was Ace’s fault (again, ‘fault’ being a rather loose term) for getting angry about the arrest, assembling a group of rebels and sparking yet another revolution. And the two of them would most likely maintain after the fact that it was one hundred percent, definitely, _entirely_ the Doctor’s fault for orchestrating the entire thing in the first place and getting them into the whole mess.

One thing had led to another, of course, as things so frequently tend to do, and the end result was that, after a quick and skilful prison break, they were being chased by the entirety of the fully-armed military team, away from the base and into the forest. Laser fire was scorching the ground around them, and more often than not, a member of their trio would have to pull another out of the line of fire.

“I can’t believe I’m saying this,” Hex was yelling between frantic inhales of air, “but I think I’m getting _used_ to this!”

“Told you it’d happen one day!” Ace, too, was panting, but she was grinning, high on adrenaline and the thrill of escape. “Little Hexxy, all grown up-”

“Oh, shut it, you!”

“Less talking, more running!” the Doctor suggested, quickly and neatly looping the handle of his umbrella around Hex’s arm in order to tug him sideways – and just in time, too; he most likely would have lost his head otherwise. “The geodesic barrier is just up ahead…”

“The geo- _what_ now?” Hex asked.

“Force-field!” Ace contributed, making a vague gesture of her hands.

“Yes, thank you, Ace – once we get through it, we should be home safe, so to speak!”

Hex squinted, brushing stray hair away from his face. “I think I see it – great blue glow-y thing, yeah?”

“That’s the one!” Ace said.

“Come on, you two!” the Doctor said, and they all redoubled their speed. The geodesic barrier that separated the base-slash-colony from the comparatively harsh and unforgiving forest that formed the rest of the planet they were on was visible just up ahead. It would have usually been completely impenetrable without the correct security clearance, but Ace had been busy during their time within the base, and she had arranged their escape and clearance with some people on the inside.

“Hey,” said Hex, slowing briefly. “They’ve stopped firing at us.”

Ace grimaced; grabbed his arm and pulled him onwards. “Trust me, that’s never a good sign. Quick, before they start-”

And before she could say anything else, an arrow whistled through the air between them, narrowly missing Ace’s ear by just a few millimetres. More quickly followed – most of them laughably off-target, but quite a lot coming far too close for comfort.

“Time to go, I think,” the Doctor said, and they all started running again.

“Arrows?” Hex asked, wheezing slightly for air. “A bit back-to-basics, isn’t it? I mean, if they’ve got lasers-”

“Does it _matter_ what sort of weapon they’re using to try to kill us?” Ace yelled. “If too many of them hit us, we’ll be dead either way!”

An arrow whistled over Hex’s head. He ducked reflexively, but it had gone far too high to be of any actual danger.

“Hah!” he yelled over his shoulder, unable to help himself. “You missed!”

“ _Mister Hex, kindly do not taunt the armed, oncoming soldier squadron._ ”

They were nearing the barrier – it was literally metres away from them, and they had a relatively clear pathway to it.

“He’s right, though,” Ace said suddenly, twisting around for a second to look. “None of the arrows are coming even _close_ to where we are. I think they might be – missing on purpose?”

“What?” the Doctor said. “No – that can’t be right, that’s ridicul- ”

And then there was a very, _very_ loud hissing noise, like they were surrounded by a thousand deadly snakes, and all of them almost simultaneously stopped in their tracks, scanning their surroundings. The soldiers that had been following them seemed to have disappeared entirely – there was no sound of their approach, and there were no projectiles flying at them – arrows or otherwise.

“Shit,” Ace whispered. “Do you smell that?”

 “Gas,” Hex said, “oh my god. The arrows – it’s gas; they’re _gassing_ us-”

“ _Run!_ ” the Doctor bellowed, one hand on each of their backs, pushing them forwards, propelling them at high speed towards the barrier. He must have done so too fast, however, because as they closed the distance, Ace stumbled over some small amount of natural debris on the ground and fell nearly flat on her face.

“Ace!” Hex yelled, slowing, but the Doctor pushed him towards the barrier again, more insistently, and went back for her himself.

She was already pulling herself to her feet, coughing and cursing – one hand clasped tightly over her nose and mouth to keep out the smoke. The Doctor hurriedly mirrored the gesture, and grabbed her other hand. They ran together at full speed towards the barrier, with Hex metres in front of them, and dived through.

The three of them passed through the glowing energy with a flash of radiant light and a faint tingling sensation, and then they were outside, gasping for breath on the mossy forest ground.

“They can’t get through, right?” Hex asked after a second, sitting up and staring at the barrier. There was no sign of anybody else passing through, but it was hard to tell – the blue energy had become completely opaque as soon as they had gone through it. There was no way to see what was happening on the other side.

“Shouldn’t be able to,” Ace said, dragging a hand through her now-messy hair. “Or at the very least, it’ll take them a day or so to override the codes that Cinn set in place.”

“The gas,” said the Doctor, rising to his feet, and casting an unreadable look at Ace and Hex. “Did it affect you in any way?”

“We weren’t exposed to it for very long,” said Hex, now glancing into the forest. It looked as if it were late evening, and although he couldn’t see any animal life, he was still immensely wary of what might be lurking within. “I reckon it was some sort of alien knockout drug, didn’t mix with our biology quick enough, or something. Probably worth checking ourselves up when we get back to the TARDIS, though,” he added. “Just in case.”

“Hm. Yes.” The Doctor was now fiddling with his sonic screwdriver, which he had pulled out of seemingly nowhere. “Very wise. Now let’s see… this way, I think.”

“You think?” Ace was giving him that familiar look – that _really, Professor?_ look that said she can see right through him, or she thought she could. (It was entirely possible that she was right, anyway.)

“I _do_ think,” he said, affronted. “Navigation is a very imprecise science, Ace.”

“Is it really, though,” Hex said, and Ace laughed. The Doctor made a tiny, outraged noise and stalked forwards through the undergrowth.

After a minute both Ace and Hex caught up to him, grinning, and the Doctor grinned too, and the three of them started exchanging gossip about the finer intricacies of their parts in the most recent revolution.

* * *

 

And for the first half hour of wandering through the forest outside the biodome, everything was fine – despite the fact that they were, of course, very _very_ lost.

And then it wasn’t.

They had fallen into a companionable silence at some point during the proceedings, walking along together comfortably, and occasionally remarking out loud upon seeing a potential indication to their location, or (on one occasion) a very good stick. Ace had taken the lead somewhat – moving in front of them to witness any potential dangers, as she tended to. Hex was following behind the Doctor, bringing up the rear, and because of this, the Doctor was the first to notice how often Ace was stumbling and tripping over nothing at all. He wouldn’t have normally been concerned – it had been a very long day, after all – but there was something about the uncertain way she was beginning to walk that worried him.

“Ace,” said the Doctor, lightly grasping the fabric of her upper sleeve to stop her from moving forwards. “Ace, look at me. Just for a second.”

Grumbling indistinctly, she complied. She blinked up at him, and seemed to be trying to figure out how to scowl at him properly. “We’ve… got to keep going,” she said, sounding unsure of what she was saying. She blinked, slowly. “The TARDIS –”

“I don’t think so.” He frowned back at her, and raised a hand to her forehead, which she tried and failed to duck away from. He felt her temperature for a moment, and then looked at her with renewed apprehension. She was far too cold by far.

“Professor… you’re…” Ace seemed to have lost her annoyance with him, and now looked just as worried as he felt. “Fever…”

“No, Ace,” he said gently. “Not me.”

If she thought that _he,_ a Time Lord with an average body temperature far below a human’s own, was warm, then something was very wrong indeed.

“But – you – Time Lords –” She appeared rather distressed now, although it was rather surprisingly not at her own condition – rather, his own non-existent one. “You – you shouldn’t be that warm. Professor –”

“Sh. Shh, Ace. Here –” He helped her down to the ground, situating her next to a large log that had fallen conveniently right in the middle of the clearing that they were in. She was very cold; enough so that she had to have been losing heat for a long while. Why hadn’t she mentioned it? “Stay here for a moment. Just try to rest.”

“I…” She blinked again. “Gotta… take care of you.” Another blink. Her eyes were slightly glazed now, although she was still looking at him with considerable concern. “Nobody… else will…”

“I know, Ace, I know.” It came out in barely a whisper. “Thank you.”

It took him far too long to remember that Hex was still there in the clearing too, and that Hex was also very human indeed and had been exposed to _whatever_ was in those gas arrows. He spun around as soon as he realized, searching for his other friend. “Mister Hex?”

“Here,” came the reply. Hex was on the outskirts of the clearing, bracing himself against a tree. It was hard to tell properly in the dim twilight of the forest, but he looked drawn and pale. “I… I gotta be honest, Doc, I’m… not feeling so good.”

The Doctor hurried over, taking the nurse’s arm and leading him carefully over to the log where Ace was situation. “No, I can’t imagine you are. Sit down.”

“Cheers,” said Hex weakly, using the Doctor’s proffered arm as support to take a seat on the log. He definitely appeared more alert than Ace had been, but a quick check of the sonic screwdriver was enough to confirm that his temperature was possibly even lower than hers, and still dropping. “Some sort of… alien flu?”

“What makes you say that?”

“Feels like normal flu,” Hex said, gaze fixed somewhere in the distant dark of the forest. “Chills an’ all. You know. Headache, too, but the chills are the worst bit.” He shivered, as if to prove his point. “But – less like a fever, more like…” He trailed off, mid-sentence, and didn’t speak for a moment.

“You’re halfway there,” the Doctor told him after the silence had stretched for quite long enough, and leaned over to take more accurate readings from Ace. “The chills you’re feeling right now are quite physical, however, as opposed to a reflexive muscle response generated by overheating.”

Hex’s eyes flickered down to Ace, who was only semi-conscious. “….reverse fever?” he ventured. He sounded detached, as if he were diagnosing a newly arrived patient rather than himself.

“Your temperature’s gone down considerably, yes,” the Doctor said. “And is still dropping, from what I can tell.”

“Shouldn’t be possible,” Hex muttered after a second of silence. The Doctor looked up to find that he was listing, rather alarmingly, to one side. “But… aliens. So – body can’t deal with this. Not used…”

The Doctor stood up quickly, and managed to stop Hex from toppling over and onto the ground. He ended up lowering him down right next to Ace, so they were inches apart. “You’re right,” he said, “the human body isn’t equipped for this kind of extreme. Normal fevers, yes, but a shock to the system this bad could result in…” He trailed off, and didn’t complete the thought.

“Warm us up,” Hex said. It seemed like a considerable struggle for him to get the words out, but the tone of his voice indicated that he very much felt it was important to communicate. “Treat like… hypothermia.”

“Yes,” said the Doctor. He removed his coat, laying it over Hex and tucking it in around him. He would be fine as he was, and Ace already had her own jacket, but night was nearly upon them and Hex only had a T-shirt. “Just try to rest.”

Hex managed a shaky nod, head falling backwards to face the twilight sky above. “Thanks,” he said, apparently referencing the coat, and then fell silent.

The Doctor checked on Ace. Her temperature was still dropping at a worrying rate, but at least it was a steady decline. (It wasn’t much comfort at all, really, but you had to take what you could get.) He propped her up higher on the log, lifting her head from the cold ground, but that was about all he _could_ do for her.

So with that accomplished, the Doctor wasted no time in collecting as many sticks and branches as he could find in the immediate vicinity, and building the bare structure of a camp fire in the middle of the clearing.

“…arrows…” Hex managed, and the Doctor paused briefly in his work.

“It was the arrows, yes,” he agreed, glancing over at him and noting that his eyes were shut – but not quite completely unresponsive; at least not yet. “At least, I’m assuming so. A nasty parting gift from our friends back at the base, I think; an airborne virus, perhaps. Most likely designed to keep us incapacitated until they catch up with us, or simply just to kill us outright.” His mouth twisted slightly in distaste. “No good will ever come of biological warfare. When will they learn-?” He broke off, realizing that Hex had been saying something during his brief moment of pontification that had been so soft he’d missed it. “I’m sorry, Mister Hex. What did you say?”

“You. Infected,” Hex said, almost choking the words out. He forced his eyes open. They were glazed and slightly unfocused, but there was an edge of fear, or something of the like, in his gaze as well. “Were there – also. Like us. You…” His voice cracked here, and he fell silent again.

The Doctor’s hands hesitated over the pyre he was building. He stared at his hands for a long moment. “Not to worry, Master Hex,” he said softly. “Time Lords have unique resistances to viruses such as these. I’ll be fine.” A pause. “Hex?”

Hex didn’t appear to have heard him. He was muttering to himself now, quite incoherently.

The Doctor winced, and pulled a matchbox from his pocket, striking it quickly and dropping it into the pile of twigs. There was no time to improvise or find anything to act as lighter fluid. He would have to attempt to maintain the fire the old-fashioned way.

The pyre caught alight, and within seconds the pile of sticks and bark was blazing. In minutes, there were waves of heat and light radiating off it, enough to light the clearing in its entirety and turn the air around them hazy and blurry.

Considering the circumstances that they were in, a fire would probably have been a bad idea – practically acting as a homing beacon to draw the soldiers closer to them. But Ace’s contact had guaranteed them at least a day leeway, and that promise would have to do to keep his fire from becoming a risk for them, because the alternative was far, far worse.

The Doctor stoked the fire quickly, ensuring that it would be able to keep burning for a while yet without his input, and then moved back to his friends, who were both practically catatonic against the fallen log.

Ace had become far too pale for his liking – all the color seemed to have been drained from her. She looked far too young; half-curled into herself on the ground, tremors running through her body. He half-carried, half-dragged her as close as he dared to the fire, and then returned to do the same for Hex.

Quite worryingly, there was a faint layer of frost forming on the bare skin of his face. His breath was unsteady and barely even there.

“No, no, _no,_ ” hissed the Doctor, and hauled him over to rest beside Ace. Barely pausing to think, he slid in between them, wrapping an arm tightly around each of them and pulling them close to his chest.

Furiously, he _willed_ his body temperature to rise – and slowly, it did. Not by much – it was taking far too much effort to do it, much more than it should have usually taken – but it would have to help. It would _have_ to. Otherwise –

Hex wheezed. A sudden, gasping breath, and then he was breathing at something slightly closer to steady and even. It didn’t sound healthy, not even close, but it was something. Something was almost always better than nothing.

Half an hour passed, and he counted every minute, every second, every tiny increment of time that fit into it. Twice he had to rise to his feet, leaving them to re-fuel the fire, but he always returned as quick as he could, bundling them tightly to his sides once more.

Ace had started shivering – a good sign; her body was now actively trying to warm itself up. They had been tiny tremors at first, but now she was shuddering almost violently; faint color starting to return to her cheeks. She kept shifting, mumbling disjointed words and phrases that were completely indistinguishable, and trying to pull away from the Doctor’s arm and the warmth of the fire. But the Doctor kept his arm around her tight, firmly tugging her back towards him. “None of that, now,” he scolded half-heartedly, knowing she probably couldn’t hear or even understand him.

She murmured and moaned, fighting against him with an unreasonable amount of force for somebody in her condition. Her hair had fallen out of its braid at some point and was growing messy and tangled around her face and shoulders, and she looked immensely frightened – of what, he didn’t dare to guess.

The Doctor looked to Hex briefly, and ascertained that he was more-or-less stable. He was sleeping, or unconscious, anyway, but it appeared to be a mostly peaceful slumber. His temperature was still far, far too low, but that was to be expected.

“All right,” he said quietly, making his decision and disentangled himself from Hex, leaving him on the ground for the moment. Placing a hand on each of her shoulders to pre-empt another escape attempt, the Doctor turned all of his attention to Ace, and frowned when she tried to twist away from him. A low temperature wouldn’t cause this amount of agitation – there must have been some other ingredient in whatever the gas had been made up of. Some kind of hallucinogenic –? He hummed lowly, trying to get her attention. “Ace…”

More inaudible gibberish. He caught a few words this time – _Nobody. Run. Fenric. Professor._

“Ace, it’s me.” He tucked a strand of hair behind her ear; tried to instil some kind of power into the words he was saying. “You’re fine. Everything is going to be fine.” He very much hoped he wasn’t lying to her.

She subsided for a moment or two, and then muttered, hopelessly, “kill her.”

It was like a knife had gone straight through his side, piercing right through both of his hearts – ice cold. He inhaled sharply, tasting the smoke on the air and the betrayal on her face. “No, Ace,” he said, and he really couldn’t stop the way that his voice cracked ever-so-slightly. “I – I wouldn’t. Not now. Not ever. You –”

And he stopped again. She wouldn’t remember this later, he was sure of it. And that made it so much easier to apologize, of course, because when it came to his friends, he was and always would be the biggest of cowards.

“I’m sorry,” he said.

Ace didn’t say anything. She just kept shivering, although she had stopped struggling against him, at the very least. He paused for a second, and then took the opportunity to swivel her around, so she was facing away from him.

His hands most certainly were not shaking as he smoothed her tangled hair back as best as he could without the aid of a comb or brush, and separated it into three segments, and she didn’t resist. Quickly but gently, he wove her hair into a neat plait, and tied it off with a stray piece of twine he dug out of his trouser pockets. He puffed out a silent breath of air, and pulled her back towards Hex and the fire.

“Henry,” Ace said, barely audible; a name he didn’t recognize. “I – I didn’t mean – I’m sorry, I – ” She sounded utterly miserable, almost desperate.

“Shh,” said the Doctor, lightly brushing the side of her face. She was still burning-cold to the touch, and she leaned into him like a child craving warmth. “It’s only a dream, Ace,” he told her softly. “Go back to sleep.”

“I’m sorry,” she repeated brokenly, a desperate appeal to the unknown Henry – or maybe to him – and then lapsed back into silence.

She was still shaking.

He wasn’t good at being gentle, not anymore, but for them he would _try._ He would put every ounce of effort he had into doing so if it helped them in even the slightest. He carefully tugged her into a hug, wrapping his arms around her as tightly as he dared.

Eventually, the shaking subsided, and she was silent once more. The Doctor touched her forehead again, and thought that maybe her temperature had gone up a degree or two – although it was hard to tell. She would be fine for a moment or so, at any rate.

Back to Hex, then. The Doctor shifted, leaning Ace against his side, and placed a hand to his forehead, checking intently. He was shivering, very similar to how Ace had been just before she had become semi-conscious. He wasn’t saying anything – no nonsense words, no pleas for help – but his forehead was crinkled up in a pained manner, and his eyes were darting frantically beneath his eyelids.

The Doctor cast his mind back, trying to remember how much of the gas each of them had inhaled. Ace had tripped and fallen behind, which meant that she had probably taken the worst of it. Hex had gotten out much quicker, meaning less of the virus was in his system. Which was almost definitely why he wasn’t in such a bad state as she was.

“Doctor?” Hex muttered, stirring.

“Yes. I’m here.” The Doctor stared at the fire, which was starting to burn lower once more. He would have to refuel it soon. “How are you feeling?”

“You’re dead.” Hex’s voice was very small. “…you died. You can’t be here. Not after – not. You. You – can’t –”

“I am most assuredly not dead,” said the Doctor, as evenly as he could manage, and tightened his grip on Hex’s shoulders pointedly. “I’m quite alive, Mister Hex, and I plan to remain as such for some time yet.”

Hex was weakly shaking his head, and his eyes snapped open – bloodshot and panicked. “No – you – I _saw_ you, you were right _there_ –” he writhed, trying to point at some location in the near distance. “You – Ace… god! What did he do with Ace?”

“She’s right here, Hex, right here next to us. Shh. It’s fine. Everything’s fine.” He wondered if he was trying to convince Hex of this, or himself. “You are both going to be _fine._ ”

Hex didn’t seem to hear him. With what seemed like an almighty effort, he shoved first the Doctor away from him, and then himself fully upright, flailing slightly, and made an aborted attempt at standing up too, before falling to the ground.

“God…” he said, eyes wide, still shaking, “oh hell, I can’t see – _why can’t I see?_ ”

Just what they needed. Another side effect. The Doctor thought for a second, and then relinquished his hold on Ace for the moment, and hurriedly rolled up his sleeve, holding his arm out in Hex’s direction. The Doctor caught at his friend’s grasping fingers, pulling them to the vicinity of his wrist – his depth perception appeared to be somewhat lacking at the moment; he couldn’t seem to do it himself. And despite being disoriented, panicked, and altogether devastatingly unwell, Hex managed to find the pulse point in less than a second. Then there was silence.

“Alive,” said the Doctor solemnly.

“Too fast,” Hex said faintly.

The Doctor nearly smiled. Nearly. “Two hearts, Hex.”

“Ah – right.” Hex sighed, arm dropping to the ground suddenly, as if he was utterly exhausted (which he probably was). “That’d probab – … that’d do it. Sorry. Sorry. It was – sorry.”

“No need to apologize.” The Doctor’s voice was quiet. “Absolutely no need at all.”

“Thanks, then,” Hex sighed, faintly.

“What for?” the Doctor asked, “Hex?” but Hex was already out – eyes closed, breathing evening out, and almost instantly, the clearing was silent again.

Hours passed – unpleasant, tense, uncertain hours full of panic and shivering and the overwhelming dread that one or both of his friends might not make it to the morning. He checked their temperatures near-continuously, and although it was slow and arduous, they were gradually growing warmer.

Somewhere around hour three, he felt himself growing tired, utterly bone-weary, and as much as he tried to shake it off, he couldn’t quite manage to. He checked on Ace first, then Hex, and they were within _degrees_ of the average human body temperature, and very close to waking up – and although he was aware that he should stay with them for longer, for some reason he couldn’t quite bring himself to care.

He removed himself from between them, allowing them to share each other’s body heat, and stumbled to the other side of the clearing. Not too close to the fire, of course; it wasn’t as if he had any need of it, anyway. And besides – besides –

Oh, he was so _very_ tired. And so very _cold._

Just a short rest, then – and then they should all be well enough to head back to the TARDIS. Yes –

There was something very wrong with this picture, he knew, but he couldn’t quite place his finger on it. Maybe it would make sense when he woke up.

So tired – so cold…

* * *

 

When consciousness finally swam back to him, he became aware of somebody warm sitting close by him, holding him in a tight embrace.

“Ace up my sleeve,” he sighed without opening his eyes, only barely audible, and his fingers found their way to the cuff of her jacket, twisting around and around and not letting go.

She shifted, a rustle of fabric, and the embrace grew tighter.

“He’s awake?” He heard somebody say, as if from a very long distance away.

From closer: “barely.” He felt her brush tentatively at his forehead, then recoil. “God. He’s cold. Colder than usual, I mean.”

The person from further away, getting closer now – “what was he _thinking?_ ”

“ _Pharmakon in one hand, calamus in the other_ ,” he murmured. “ _Circulate through the corridors, become rejoined, bounce off each other, contradict each other, make trouble_.”

A pause. He could hear the crackling of the fire.

“Okay,” said the further-away voice, “what the hell’s he talking about?”

“No bloody clue.”

“Derrida,” he told them, quite lucidly, really, “1981. _Plato’s Pharmacy._ ”

“…still got nothing.” Another rustle. “Can’t do this myself. Hex, get in ‘ere.”

“…I – are you sure?”

“’Course I’m sure. It’s not like I have exclusive rights to him, you know, especially not _now._ And besides, you’re shivering.”

“Yeah. I’m still feeling kinda chilly.” And then the second voice was closer, right next to him, and there were a second pair of arms around him, more tentatively this time. “Oof. You’re right, he’s still freezing.”

“I’ve always thought of seven as my lucky number,” he said. “The English language is divided, when it comes to that – _septa-_ or _hepta-,_ I wonder? I always preferred the more sibilant of the two, really.”

“…does he _ever_ shut up?”

“Probably not, no.” Said with an impressive amount of affection. “Shh, Professor, you’re rambling – go back to sleep.”

“The prefix for a _singular_ item,” he said in her general direction, and tried to open his eyes. He gave it up as a lost cause about halfway through. “Even more divided. Uni – mono – well, never mind that. The cards have it right, as always, don’t they?”

They appeared to both be ignoring him, because he – one on his left – said, “fire’s burning down again. Want me to restock it?”

“No. I’ll do it.”

“Ace,” he breathed, felt her stop and rest a hand on his arm, “ace-ace-ace. Singular, one of you – unique. One.”

“Well, I do try,” she said, and untwisted his hand from her jacket sleeve. “Be right back. Don’t worry.”

He knew he didn’t have to, but couldn’t help but do so anyway. “Six is rather more simple,” he said instead, distracting himself. “Everybody knows it. _Hexagon, hexadecimal –_ I gave it away, didn’t I? I was building up to the ending, and I spoilt it ahead of time. How typical of me. Or…”

“Yeah, Doctor.” The arm from his left side wrapped a bit tighter around him. Squeeze. Odd. How odd. “That’s me. I’m Hex. I’m right here.” How strange – he used to be all about physical contact, didn’t he? And then that stopped; became distant and – not detached. More reserved. Whyever did he stop?

“I’m very lucky,” he said quietly. “That was the ending, the finale; what I’ve been trying to say.”

She returned; sat beside him, and held him tight. He protected them, took care of them, remained at their sides for hours upon hours, and now they are returning that favour with just as much ferocity and loyalty as he did to them.

“Six plus one, Ace plus Hex – seven. _Sept._ Always back to there. I’m not superstitious, but – I suppose just this once, I shall have to make an exception.”

“Shh.” Her voice was soft, both amused and worried at once. “Just rest, Professor.”

“Don’t worry, Doctor.” His voice was equally soft. “Don’t worry about a thing. We’ve got you, yeah?”

_I know you have,_ he thought but did not say, _and I can’t thank you enough._

“Very lucky indeed,” he murmured, and then he was gone.


End file.
